Men of Action

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Text originally published in 1947 under the same title.

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MEN OF ACTION

BY

COMMANDER KENNETH EDWARDS R.N.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Contents

TABLE OF CONTENTS 3

DEDICATION 4

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 5

ROBERT LINDSAY BURNETT, C.B., D.S.O., O.B.E.—Rear-Admiral in His Majesty’s Fleet 6

SIR HAROLD MARTIN BURROUGH, K.B.E., C.B., D.S.O.—Vice-Admiral in His Majesty’s Fleet 16

JOHN AUGUSTINE COLLINS, C.B.—Captain, Royal Australian Navy 25

SIR ANDREW BROWNE CUNNINGHAM, BART., G.C.B., D.S.O.—Admiral of the Fleet 39

SIR HENRY HARWOOD HARWOOD, K.C.B., O.B.E.—Vice-Admiral in His Majesty’s Fleet 56

SIR MAX KENNEDY HORTON, K.C.B., D.S.O.—Admiral in His Majesty’s Fleet 70

SIR ARTHUR LUMLEY ST. GEORGE LYSTER, K.C.B., C.V.O., C.B.E., D.S.O.—Vice-Admiral in His Majesty’s Fleet 81

LORD LOUIS MOUNTBATTEN, G.C.V.O., D.S.O., A.D.C.—Captain, Royal Navy; Acting-Admiral 91

SIR PERCY LOCKHART HARNAM NOBLE, K.C.B., C.V.O.—Admiral in His Majesty’s Fleet 106

ALBERT LAWRENCE POLAND, C.B., D.S.O., D.S.C.—Captain, Royal Navy 119

SIR ALFRED DUDLEY PICKMAN ROGERS POUND, G.C.B., O.M., G.C.V.O.—Admiral of the Fleet 130

SIR HENRY DANIEL PRIDHAM-WIPPELL, K.C.B., C.V.O.—Vice-Admiral in His Majesty’s Fleet 148

GEORGE WALTER GILLOW SIMPSON, C.B.E.—Captain, Royal Navy 159

SIR JAMES FOWNES SOMERVILLE, K.C.B., K.B.E., D.S.O.—Admiral in His Majesty’s Fleet 172

GRAHAM HENRY STOKES, C.B., D.S.C.—Captain, Royal Navy 186

ROBERT GRICE STURGES, C.B., D.S.O.—Major-General, Royal Marines 194

SIR JOHN CRONYN TOVEY, G.C.B., K.B.E., D.S.O.—Admiral in His Majesty’s Fleet 208

SIR PHILLIP LOIS VIAN, K.B.E., D.S.O.—Rear-Admiral in His Majesty’s Fleet 223

SIR WILLIAM FREDERICK WAKE-WALKER, K.C.B., C.B.E.—Vice-Admiral in His Majesty’s Fleet 240

REQUEST FROM THE PUBLISHER 260

DEDICATION

"To all who serve with them."

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

REAR-ADMIRAL R. L. BURNETT

VICE-ADMIRAL SIR H. M. BURROUGH

CAPTAIN J. A. COLLINS

ADMIRAL OF THE FLEET SIR ANDREW CUNNINGHAM, BT.

VICE-ADMIRAL SIR H. HARWOOD

ADMIRAL SIR MAX K. HORTON

VICE-ADMIRAL SIR A. L. ST. G. LYSTER

THE LORD LOUIS MOUNTBATTEN

ADMIRAL SIR PERCY L. H. NOBLE

CAPTAIN A. L. POLAND

ADMIRAL OF THE FLEET SIR DUDLEY POUND

VICE-ADMIRAL SIR H. D. PRIDHAM-WIPPELL

CAPTAIN G. W. G. SIMPSON

ADMIRAL SIR JAMES F. SOMERVILLE

CAPTAIN G. H. STOKES

MAJOR-GENERAL R. G. STURGES

ADMIRAL SIR JOHN C. TOVEY

REAR-ADMIRAL SIR PHILIP L. VIAN

VICE-ADMIRAL SIR W. F. WAKE-WALKER

ROBERT LINDSAY BURNETT, C.B., D.S.O., O.B.E.—Rear-Admiral in His Majesty’s Fleet

IT IS a traditional ceremony in the Royal Navy that when commanding officers and flag officers come on board a warship they do so to the trilling of bos’ns’ pipes. This ceremony of piping the side is a survival of the days when senior officers were hoisted on board in a bos’n’s chair at the end of a rope or whip led through a block at the yard arm. The pipe was the order to hoist away.

Tens of thousands of naval officers have been honoured in the traditional way as they have stepped up the gangway on to the quarter-deck, but only one has been so honoured while being actually hoisted on board in a bos’n’s chair at sea in wartime. That officer is Rear-Admiral Robert Lindsay Burnett.

The incident happened in far northern waters, when circumstances made it necessary for Rear-Admiral Burnett to transfer his flag from the light cruiser Scylla to the destroyer Milne. The weather was too bad for the ships to lie alongside one another and Rear-Admiral Burnett climbed into a bos’n’s chair (which is merely a wooden seat like that of a swing or the rung of a rope ladder), hooked on to the wire of the Scylla’s aircraft crane. With this he was hoisted off the cruiser’s deck, swung outboard across the tumbling water between the two ships, and lowered on to the deck of the Milne. As he swung over to the destroyer six seamen stood up in the whaler at the davit-heads and piped the Admiral on board. As he landed on the deck his Rear-Admiral’s flag broke at the destroyer’s masthead.

The men who enacted this little ceremony had been fighting for several days and nights, running a convoy to north Russia through the worst that the U-boats and the Luftwaffe could do. It has been said that tradition dies hard. In the Royal Navy the best of tradition never dies.

Bob Burnett, he is called in the Navy. He is of medium height, thick-set, with fair hair and what might be termed a ruddy complexion, and an ever-ready laugh. Had the sobriquet not already been applied to another naval officer, there is no doubt that he would have been known as the jolly sailor.

Like so many of the men who have distinguished themselves in this war, Bob Burnett is a small-ship officer. At the beginning of the last war he was First Lieutenant of the destroyer Laertes, in the Harwich Force. On the very first day of hostilities he was in action, when the German minelayer Königin Luise was sunk in the North Sea. At the Battle of the Heligoland Bight the Laertes was hit and put out of action by the German cruiser Mainz at the very moment that the Laertes torpedoed the Mainz. The Laertes had to be towed back across the North Sea, but while in tow her crew patched up her damaged boilers and succeeded in raising steam. There are many who allege that the Laertes deliberately parted the tow in order to avoid being ignominiously lugged into harbour at the end of a string.

The Laertes was also present at the Battle of the Dogger Bank, during which she picked up many of the survivors from the sunken German cruiser Blücher.

In February, 1915, Burnett got his first command. This was the tiny Torpedo-boat No. 26. He was then twenty-seven years of age and was a lieutenant of rather less than five years’ seniority. Of one of his exploits in this craft, Bob Burnett has a unique photographic record. It is entitled Alone I Did It and illustrates the story of an overland journey which T.B. No. 26 did as a result of a navigational error. He says that he keeps it as a reminder that even in the olden days he was not entirely free from human error. The eyes of many young officers have wandered to that picture for comfort when they have been on the mat" in Burnett’s cabin!

For the rest of the 1914-18 war Burnett commanded destroyers—Paisley, Acheron, Nessus and Scotsman—mostly with the Grand Fleet, but he also had experience in the Western Approaches and in the Dover Patrol.

Shortly before the Armistice Burnett was taken from sea appointments to help reorganise the Physical Training branch of the Navy, and after two years at Portsmouth, he spent the next three years on the staff of Admiral Sir John de Robeck, the Commander-in-Chief, Mediterranean Fleet, as the first Fleet Recreational Officer in either the Mediterranean or Atlantic Fleets.

Burnett went back to destroyers in 1931 as a young captain. He then took command of the 8th Destroyer Flotilla on the China Station, where his ships spent the greater part of their time on anti-piracy patrols.

As a senior captain, he was Commodore of the Royal Naval Barracks at Chatham, where he had the arduous task of mobilising the personnel of the East country manning port for war. He hoisted his flag as an Acting Rear-Admiral in December, 1940, and in March, 1942, he was appointed Rear-Admiral Commanding the destroyer flotillas of the Home Fleet.

Sport and physical training are his passions. He is a springer, as the Navy calls those who have specialised in physical and recreational training, and has been Director of Physical Training and Secretary of the Royal Navy and Royal Marines Sports Control Board. As such he has probably done more than any other officer for the sport and physical training of the Service. Nor has his concern with athletics been purely administrative. He has held the sabre championship at the Royal Tournament and is a very keen fencer and boxer. He tells a story of his final appearance in the ring, when, at the age of thirty-two, he took a stone and a half and a grand hiding from the great Jim Driscoll in a three-round alleged exhibition contest.

Besides adjudicating at the English Fencing Championships, he has refereed much first-class Rugby Football and Boxing. On occasions he has occupied the Chair at the old National Sporting Club and at the Albert Hall, but the greatest pleasure he got was in officiating at the meetings of the East End boys’ clubs. He is also a qualified referee for association football, hockey and water polo.

Having, during a considerable part of his career, looked upon games as his work—albeit a most pleasant form of work—one of his greatest recreations was, in peace time, theatrical production. Many naval officers and ratings, and some fortunate others, remember with delight those striking musical comedies which Bob Burnett produced when he was Second-in-Command of the battleship Rodney.

In the present war Rear-Admiral Burnett will be remembered as the man who fought the greatest Allied convoy through to north Russia against prolonged and determined attacks by U-boats and aircraft.

The big convoy was sighted by enemy aircraft and by U-boats on September 9th, 1942, when it was north-east of Iceland, and still out of attacking range of the enemy’s air bases in northern Norway. Burnett expected attacks by numbers of U-boats to begin almost at once, but these did not materialise. It may be that the reason for this immunity is to be found in the Admiralty communiqué describing the passage of this convoy. The communiqué stated that: In this early stage one U-boat was attacked and probably seriously damaged.

It is well-known that the British Admiralty errs on the side of caution in assessing the results of attacks on U-boats, demanding absolute proof of destruction before admitting that a U-boat has been more than probably damaged. If the U-boat attacked was the one which had reported the convoy, and the only U-boat in the vicinity, as might well have been the case if it was outward or homeward bound by the usual northern route, and if that U-boat was sunk, it would account for the immunity of the convoy from U-boat attack for three days after it had first been sighted.

Rear-Admiral Burnett, commanding the convoy escort, with his flag flying in the light cruiser Scylla, could in any case not afford to relax his vigilance. He was well aware that he had had bad luck in being sighted so early in the voyage, and that this would give the enemy plenty of time to prepare a very hot reception for the convoy, particularly when it had to pass through the channel between northern Norway and the edge of the Arctic ice pack, in almost perpetual daylight, with the enemy’s air bases close along the flank of its route, and with insufficient sea-room to enable effective evading action to be taken. Burnett’s expectations were to be fully realised.

On September 12th the convoy was again sighted by enemy aircraft. This time it was near enough to the enemy’s bases to allow the aircraft to shadow the convoy. Moreover, the groping finger of the Asdic had detected U-boats. It was soon clear that there was a pack of U-boats in the vicinity of the convoy, for destroyer after destroyer screening the convoy detected U-boats and attacked them with depth charges. The escorts had to work hard and fast, but they worked effectively. The U-boats did not score the successes which the German High Command expected of them, to judge by the claims they made, and it seems more than likely that some of the U-boats were either destroyed, or retired from the fray damaged and with crews badly shaken.

Next day was the 13th. It was the day on which took place the most concentrated attack on a convoy which has been delivered in the whole course of the war. There were losses among the attackers and among the ships in convoy, but the bulk of the convoy sailed on, and that was a measure of the German failure.

The Germans used U-boats and aircraft in these attacks, the latter aiming both bombs and torpedoes at the convoy. They also tried a new technique. Seeing that the convoy was close to the edge of the Arctic ice pack and therefore had scant space in which to manœuvre, they used aircraft to drop mines ahead of the convoy.

One can well imagine that Rear-Admiral Burnett had his hands full in dealing with all these varied forms of attack. He had stationed the Scylla almost in the centre of the convoy, where the concentrated fire of her anti-aircraft guns would afford the maximum protection to the ships in convoy, irrespective of the direction from which the enemy attacked. Around the fringes of the convoy was stationed the largest destroyer escort given to any convoy. In the vicinity was an aircraft carrier, carrying Sea-Hurricane fighters for the discomfiture of the Luftwaffe.

The first air attack of the day was made by half a dozen bombers. They were chary of approaching close to the British guns and dropped their bombs—harmlessly—from a great height through gaps in the clouds.

The next attack was far more serious.

Large group of enemy aircraft approaching on the starboard bow, came the warning signal.

It was a large group. On the bridge of the Scylla they counted forty-two of them—all Junkers 88 or Heinkel III, each aircraft carrying two torpedoes—that meant at least eighty-four torpedoes. They came into the attack almost at sea level, and as they came within range every gun in the convoy and the escort ships opened fire. The Scylla’s long-range guns were soon joined by the destroyer’s main armaments. Then the shorter range quick-firing weapons came into action—pom-poms, Oerlikons, Bren guns, and multiple machine-guns all added to the inferno of din.

Aircraft were hit; aircraft crashed; but still some came on, and in a moment they were weaving about among the ships, some flying at mast height and some even below deck level. From the flag-deck of the Scylla an observer found himself actually looking down on Heinkels and Junkers.

Finding the barrage too hot, many of the German aircraft zoomed up, trying to gain cloud cover and get free of that part of the air which was so full of flying metal and explosive. When they did so they met the Sea-Hurricanes from the carrier. In a moment the air below the cloud ceiling, above the clouds, and in gaps in the clouds, was full of aircraft twisting and turning in combat.

With so much happening at once and so fast, nobody had time to keep accurate count of the enemy aircraft shot down or damaged. On one bow could be seen a streak of flame and smoke as a German aircraft took its last dive; on the other side there was a great splash, and when the spray cleared the Swastika-marked tail of an aircraft could be seen sticking out of the water like a crazy pagan tombstone.

Rear-Admiral Burnett certainly had no time to assess the extent of the mauling which the attackers had received. It was inevitable, with so many torpedoes dropped, that some should find their marks, and he was concerned solely with the safety of the merchant ships consigned to his charge for this most dangerous of all voyages. There were survivors to be picked up, and picked up quickly from the icy Arctic waters if they were to survive. A quick and correct decision had to be made of what to do with a merchant ship which was damaged so that she could no longer maintain the speed of the convoy. There were those mines which had been sown by aircraft ahead of the convoy to be plotted and avoided. And all the time there was the certainty of renewed heavy attacks, both by aircraft and U-boats.

He had not long to wait for the next attack, but it was nothing like as strong as that which the convoy and its escorts had already sustained—testimony, perhaps, that the first attackers had suffered more loss than Burnett knew. Moreover, while the courage and determination of the German pilots in the first big torpedo attack proclaimed them the first eleven; by comparison, the pilots of the aircraft in this afternoon attack were definitely second eleven.

There were nine torpedo-carrying aircraft in this attack—eighteen torpedoes—and every one of those torpedoes was dropped at long range. Not one hit a ship. The naval fighter aircraft broke up the enemy formation, and the barrage proved too hot for them to penetrate. Two enemy aircraft were seen to crash into the sea, and others were certainly badly damaged. The convoy and its escorts sailed on.

At dusk there came the fourth air attack of the day. Again they were torpedo-bombers—a dozen of them this time, carrying twenty-four torpedoes.

Again the Sea-Hurricanes from the carrier sailed in among them, breaking up their formations and giving them plenty to think about apart from their attacks. Again the guns of the ships in convoy and of their escorts pumped out thousands of shells and bullets in a terrific barrage. And again the combined efforts of the fighters and the guns frustrated the attack, forcing the enemy pilots to drop their torpedoes at long range and devote all their faculties to trying to escape from the aerial maelstrom. Six out of those twelve German torpedo-bombers failed to escape and were seen to crash. Others were damaged.

The short Arctic night, which was merely twilight, gave all too brief respite to men who had been in action almost continuously through the long day, but they were sustained by the knowledge that they had withstood the largest and most determined air attack ever delivered, and had beaten off all attacks, inflicting considerable loss on the enemy. At least thirteen enemy aircraft had been seen to crash, and it seemed likely that many others would take no further part in operations.

Rear-Admiral Burnett looked with some pardonable pride at the convoy. One long fierce day had passed, and the great majority of the ships of the largest convoy ever consigned to north Russia were still steaming imperturbably towards Murmansk. There would be other days, rather longer and probably as fierce, before the convoy could be delivered to its destination, but that first day somehow gave him confidence for the future.

At dawn next morning—September 14th—the enemy returned to the attack. This time he sent in his U-boats—a big pack of them. Instead of the air around the convoy being torn with shells, the water around it was humped into hillocks by the deep explosions of depth charges. Several U-boats were attacked. How many were sunk and how many damaged will not be known until the enemy’s records come to be examined after the war. One was certainly sunk. The depth charge explosions brought to the surface a quantity of oil and bubbles. These in themselves would have been regarded only as an indication of having worried the U-boat, since a submarine can emit oil and bubbles at will without being damaged. There came to the surface other things, however, and these gave proof to conjecture—the wreckage of wooden gratings, green vegetables held in readiness for the next few meals.

Only in the years to come will it be possible to assess the full results of this concentrated U-boat attack. At present, apart from the green veg. U-boat, one can only give the official Admiralty assessment that two U-boats were almost certainly sunk and four others probably seriously damaged during the whole operation. There is not an officer or man who served in that convoy or its escort who would not swear that no estimate has ever been so conservative.

The Germans left the U-boats a free hand during the forenoon, and apparently held off their aircraft for fear of confusing the U-boat commanders. This, it may be noted in parenthesis, was in sharp contrast to British practice in the central Mediterranean, where air and submarine attacks were frequently synchronised to the greater discomfiture of the enemy.

As it was, no air attack developed until afternoon. Then twenty-two torpedo-carrying aircraft came in to attack. This attack was significant, and a tribute to the work of the Sea-Hurricanes from the aircraft carrier. The German pilots clearly thought that they could not hope to attack the convoy successfully until the aircraft carrier had been disposed of. They concentrated on her, but she came safely through, and her commanding officer made a signal to Rear-Admiral Burnett: Have had the honour of being the sole object of attack. That signal reflected the spirit of the whole force under Burnett’s command.

The Luftwaffe, however, was far from having shot its bolt, and its task was now easier since the convoy was, unavoidably, closer to the aerodromes in northern Norway. Shortly after the concentrated attack on the aircraft carrier, a dozen bombers appeared and bombed the convoy systematically but ineffectually from a great height. This attack was slow in developing and deliberate in character, the aircraft waiting for and taking advantage of gaps in the clouds. It lasted for an hour and a quarter, but the only success the enemy gained was the exasperation of the anti-aircraft gun crews with the cloud conditions.

The gunners of the convoy and its escorts soon had plenty to do, however, for the high-level bombing attack was followed almost immediately by an attack by twenty-five torpedo bombers. The Sea-Hurricanes, which had been chasing the high-level bombers above the clouds, dived down to intercept, and once again they broke up the German formations and then left their final discomfiture to the anti-aircraft guns. The combination of fighters and guns proved effective. The attack was broken up and driven off.

This torpedo attack developed before the high-level bombing had ceased, and naval fighters from the carrier were at one time in combat both above and below the cloud ceiling. In their fighting they exhibited sublime indifference to everything except the destruction of the enemy, and in their combats in the air they frequently chased a damaged German aircraft through the terrific barrage put up by the ships.

Rear-Admiral Burnett reported officially: I shall never forget the reckless gallantry of the naval fighter pilots in their determination to get in among the enemy, despite the solid mass of our defensive fire of every type.

That day high-level bombing had been succeeded by attack by torpedo-carrying aircraft; and then bombers again tried their hands. They achieved nothing but expenditure of their own material and loss of their own aircraft.

The second fierce day closed with a score of at least one U-boat certainly destroyed, a minimum of twenty-four German aircraft certainly shot down, and many others badly damaged.

As dusk fell Bob Burnett and his men could again look at the great convoy forging on towards Murmansk and feel both pride and relief in their hearts. The enemy had thrown in all he had, but had achieved nothing but loss to himself.

Tired men and a tired Admiral could not afford the luxury of rest. The Arctic night, amounting only to a couple of hours of twilight, gave all too brief respite.

No sooner was it fully light on September 15th than the enemy air attacks started again. Between fifty and seventy aircraft were sent in to carry out high-level and dive-bombing attacks. It was a large force of aircraft, but it contained no torpedo-carrying planes. It seemed as if the enemy had shot at least one of his bolts.

The defence of the convoy during these bombing attacks was hampered by low clouds, but the enemy aircraft certainly did not have things all their own way. Above the clouds they were set upon by the Sea-Hurricanes from the much-attacked but undamaged carrier, and every time they showed themselves below the cloud ceiling they were met by a most intense anti-aircraft fire from the ships.

This air attack lasted some time, but it was finally beaten off. It was far from being the only preoccupation of the Admiral in charge. The German High Command, as if in desperation, had again sent their U-boats in to the attack.

This U-boat attack, however, met with no more success than the air attacks which immediately preceded it. Destroyers attacked several U-boats with depth charges, and one of these attacks seemed conclusive, in that it brought wreckage as well as oil and bubbles of air to the surface.

There was only one more attack on the convoy. This was carried out by twenty-four dive-bombers shortly before the convoy got in to Murmansk. Again it was unsuccessful and cost the enemy losses, two aircraft being certainly shot down.

So the biggest convoy reached Russia after fighting its way day after day through a succession of the most formidable attacks which the enemy could mount. The products of the arms factories of Britain and the United States were carried to our Allies by the devotion and determination of the crews of the ships in convoy and their escorts.

In February, 1943, it was officially announced that, up to the end of 1942, 6,714 tanks, more than 15,600 aircraft, 85,000 trucks, 70,000,000 rounds of small-arms ammunition, and hundreds of thousands of tons of other supplies had been sent to Russia. A goodly proportion of this large-scale aid had been conveyed in the convoy which Rear-Admiral Burnett saw through. There had been losses in the convoy; it was inevitable that there should be, with the enemy attacking on such a scale for so long a period. The losses, however, were far less than might have been expected, and they certainly bore no relation to the statements of the German High Command, which boasted that thirty-eight out of forty-eight ships in the convoy had been sunk, and also six naval vessels of the convoy escort. In point of fact, no escort ship had been lost. Four of our naval aircraft were lost, but three of their pilots were saved.

On the credit side, apart from the delivery of large quantities of vital war materials to Russia, could be counted at least forty German aircraft certainly destroyed and many more damaged. There was also that conservative Admiralty assessment of successes against U-boats—two U-boats, almost certainly sunk and four others seriously damaged.

There were two other big items to put on the credit side. One was the prodigal German expenditure of valuable torpedoes, and the other the results of the mauling which the Luftwaffe had received at the hands of Bob Burnett’s ships.

In the attacks on that convoy the enemy used 110 torpedo-bombers, each carrying two torpedoes. The Germans therefore squandered 220 valuable torpedoes, to say nothing of the bomb loads of nearly 150 aircraft, with a very small return. The massing of these heavy weapons in the far north of Norway, where there are neither railways nor roads, must have strained the German transport organisation as well as their production. Experience was to show that the enemy had either expended his bombs and torpedoes or that his air forces in northern Norway had suffered so much loss and damage as to be virtually out of operation. At all events, the return convoy was not attacked from the air, although it must have presented a tempting target as it passed within easy range of the German air bases. Moreover, the Germans never again utilised such formidable forces against our north Russian convoys. In this way Burnett’s convoy tempered the wind for its successors.

Rear-Admiral Burnett’s work was by no means over when he delivered the merchant ships of the eastbound convoy to Murmansk. He had to turn round and escort a homeward-bound convoy back to the British Isles. It was a grim prospect, having to escort ships in ballast through those same waters just after having been given so vivid a demonstration of the attacking forces at the disposal of the enemy.

In the event, however, the Luftwaffe seemed to have had enough and did not molest the homeward-bound convoy at all. A number of U-boats did attack—and were promptly and effectively counterattacked with depth charges. It was again a case of intense and unending vigilance for all concerned, but on the whole the homeward voyage proved an anti-climax.

The escort, however, lost two ships, the minesweeper H.M.S. Leda and the destroyer H.M.S. Somali. The loss of the latter ship was a bitter disappointment after a prolonged attempt to save her and get her to port where her injuries could be repaired. For more than three days the crippled Somali was towed by another destroyer, and all the time the weather was deteriorating. Then, in the early hours of the fourth day, the sea rose suddenly and the Somali broke in two and sank. A magnificent feat of seamanship deserved a better reward, but fortunately the casualties were light.

It was just after the turn round of the escorting forces after delivering the outward convoy and picking up the homeward-bound ships that Bob Burnett transferred his flag from the Scylla to a destroyer, being hoisted from one ship to another by crane. The Scylla had on board a number of survivors from ships sunk in the outward-bound convoy. Many of these were injured and suffering from immersion in the Arctic Ocean, and needed more medical attention than could be given on board the light cruiser. It was therefore decided that the Scylla should not linger with the convoy, but go ahead at high speed to land the injured at the earliest possible moment. Rear-Admiral Burnett, of course, stayed with the convoy, and was therefore transferred from the Scylla to the destroyer Milne.

When Bob Burnett got back to Great Britain from this double convoy operation he turned to a man who had been with him on the bridge of the Scylla during some of the fiercest enemy attacks. Well, were you frightened? he asked.

Yes, very, sometimes, he answered.

Burnett’s remark was characteristic. So was I, he said, very. And any man who says he was not is a B.F. There is no nonsense about Bob Burnett.

For that convoy operation Rear-Admiral Burnett was created a C. B. The running of this convoy to north Russia was not the only operation which Rear-Admiral Burnett conducted in. his capacity as Rear-Admiral commanding the Home Fleet Destroyer Flotillas, and in March, 1943, he was awarded the D.S.O. for bravery and skill in another operation in northern waters, but that is a story which cannot yet be told.

SIR HAROLD MARTIN BURROUGH, K.B.E., C.B., D.S.O.—Vice-Admiral in His Majesty’s Fleet

THERE is only one way of describing Admiral Burrough. That is not by stringing adjectives together, but by dressing him up. Put him into breeches and gaiters: give him side-whiskers and a flat top-hat: increase his girth: and you have—John Bull.

Nor is the likeness purely physical. The naval operations which have been led by Burrough have been, to say the least of it, tricky: the Vaagso Raid, the most vital of the Malta convoys, and the Allied landing at Algiers. They have shown that Harold Burrough has the steadfastness of John Bull. He also has the kindliness and the twinkling humour. Moreover, he has deeply rooted in his character an intense idealism—the same type of idealism which, misunderstood by foreigners, makes John Bull’s actions unpredictable to the Latin and the Teuton and has led to the sobriquet of perfide Albion. Burrough is the last man in the world to preach about it, but he believes passionately that this war is being fought not only to purge the world from the Beasts, but also to set up a new world dominated by the spirit of service that he has found among the men with whom he has worked and fought. He holds that in that spirit of service lies the hope of the world—and who shall say that he is not right?

This spirit of service may be more obvious to Burrough than to some other men, simply because it is so strong in him. For that very reason, he inspires it in others. He is essentially a leader. When, during the great Malta convoy action, he was forced to leave his flagship because she was damaged and could not continue with the convoy, Admiral Burrough leant over the bridge of the stricken ship and said to the men assembled on her listing decks: I hate to leave you like this, but my job is to get the convoy through to Malta, and I’m going to do that whatever happens. Unfortunately I can obviously no longer do it from this ship.

From the decks came shouts of men volunteering to go with their admiral into the most dangerous waters in the world, but Burrough shook his head. No, he said, your job is to stop here and get your ship safely home.

Don’t worry, sir, shouted the seamen. We’ve been with you in her for two years now, and we’re not going to let her go.

They didn’t. The cruiser got safely back to harbour, and Admiral Burrough took the convoy on to Malta, heartened in his hours of trial by that little demonstration of friendship and confidence from the men of his flagship.

Burrough, who first went to pea as a midshipman on 30th September, 1904, was a gunnery specialist. Two years before the war he reached what is commonly regarded as the peak of a naval gunnery officer’s career—the command of H.M.S. Excellent, the gunnery school at Whale Island, Portsmouth. Then he was Assistant Chief of the Naval Staff at the Admiralty for a time, before hoisting his flag in command of one of the cruiser squadrons of the Home Fleet.

It was just before the late dawn of a northern winter day—the 27th of December, 1941—that H.M.S. Kenya, flying his flag, led a diverse collection of ships into the calm waters of a Norwegian fiord. On the bridge of the Kenya stood Rear-Admiral Burrough, and beside him stood Brigadier (now Major-General) J. C. Haydon, D. S. O., of the Irish Guards. They were conducting what was, up to that time, the largest combined operation of the war, and which will go down to history as the Vaagso Raid.

It was an eerie and dangerous business, leading the expedition into the narrow fiord. Surprise is everything in a raid of this sort, but how long could the ships hope to be undetected on their passage up the fiord? The peaceful calm of the fiord made absolute silence essential. Nor could the natural desire for haste be allowed to prevail, for the wake and wash of a ship at speed would at once have given them away. It was a case for self-discipline, made the more difficult because of the sharp contrast between the very rough passage of the North Sea in a full gale and the oppressive calm of the fiord.

An officer who was on the bridge of the Kenya has said: It was a very eerie, sensation entering the fiord in absolute silence and very slowly. I wondered what was going to happen, for it seemed that the ship had lost her proper element; that she was no longer a free ship at sea.

Astern of the Kenya followed the infantry landing ships, carrying the troops and with the landing craft hanging at their davits. These were closely guarded by destroyers.

This force was steaming up Vaags Fiord, south of Stadtlandet, the prominent peninsular on the south-west coast of Norway. Vaags Fiord runs into Ulversund, a narrow but deep navigational channel between the mainland and the large off-lying island of Vaagso. This channel is but a part of what is known to